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Friday, 25 February 2011

Today I really, really miss my cat, who lives back in Sweden. It seems like everyone has a little fur-ball of their own to cuddle with, wherever I go, and I'm not allowed to have one in this apartment. Besides, I want my cat, not just any cat.

The last time I saw him, over Christmas, he had been hurt in a fight and had to have suregry on his face. It was horrible to see him like that, I almost fainted in the veterinarians office and could not stay in the room when he cut in him. Now he's fine again, but not here.

Thursday, 24 February 2011

So, I've seen this oversized-shirt at Monki on sale for some time now. And I've really liked the pattern but not the model. So I ended up buying it for the tiny amount of 80 NOK with the intention of re-maiking it to a pillow-case. And this is how that happened:

The shirt was bought and brought home. Look at this nice pattern! Eclectic.

I started by using another pillow-case as a template. Isn't the one pretty too?

Enter my awesome sewing-machine. A gift from A at my 25th birthday.

I knew that I pretty much just wanted to sew two squares of the fabric together and using the existing buttons and holes to put the cushion inside. It actually worked out fine! The sewing itself was totally unplanned with only a vague idea of how it should be done. This can be seen on the final result, but only if you look closely. And honestly, how often do people do that?

Finished! All in all it took about 30 minutes. Except for the 30 minutes when I had some serious trouble threading the machine... I don't use it often enough - when I actually used the manual it was really easy...

Saturday, 19 February 2011

Today I woke up and saw warm, yellow sunshine filter in through the blinds. Good start of the day! Soon I got a bit restless since I don't really know what to do with a beautiful day like this. A was busy and I got bored. So I took the bus in to the city centre and did some shopping.

black skirt from Oasis, sunglasses and wrist warmers from Lindex, dress with birds on from Vila, and a pansy-cardigan from H&M

I found some really nice stuff- softer colours and patterns that will work nicely for spring, but shopping was still not really how I wanted to spend the first day with spring-feeling in the air. When A came to join me my mood took a turn for the better and we sat at a coffee-shop looking at people for an hour. Very nice.

Tonight we're meeting some friends for dinner, until then I'm going to re-furnish and spring-clean our home-office!

The apartment that inspires me the most right now belongs to M & S. And since M is my brother I feel hopeful that good taste runs in the family and that I maybe have some of it too. The apartment is from the 50s and has all of the basics right - stone window sills, parquet flooring in a herringbone pattern, and a layout that consist of rooms of good sizes, not to big. And it has a separate kitchen, not open plan, and I like that. Here are some pictures from this well composed dwelling north of Stockholm:

living room

guest room

kitchen

What I like about how M & S have decorated the place is the use of colours and patterns - there's a lot of them, but well combined and never too much. And they have amazing art, placed at the right place.

And the more green plants the better.
I should have taken more pictures, but I forgot.

Friday, 18 February 2011

To find out what the word for this thing was in English I just surfed in to IKEAs homepage, Canadian version. Good stuff. I really had never heard the description "magazine file" before, totally new for me. Anyway, that's what I have pimped this time.
In a magazines' point of view I did it in a very macabre way by first tearing a couple of old magazines to shreds. Hey, I can be real aggressive when I need to be. Here's the full process, even though it might be a little bit overly explanatory for such a simple thing. (It's not that I think anyone here is stupid, I just like words.)

Step one: Buy boring cardboard magazine files on Claes Ohlson.

Step two: find some old magazines and tear out pieces of the nicest pictures, not too carefully.

Step three: sort the pieces by colour

Step four: glue the paper on the box with decoupage-glue, colour-coordinated. Leave to dry.

Finished. Place in suitable location and revel in the joyous activity of organising

Tuesday, 15 February 2011

I have been hunting for new glasses for a while now, especially since my old pair broke. Fortunately I have a backup pair, but they're not really "me". So how happy was I when one of the magazines I subscribe to had a free pair on it's cover! Very convenient, and since this is the union-magazine of my particular trade I just have to trust that this is what a girl like me should wear this season. And I got to use my scissors and glue, always a good sign of great design in my book.

DIY - glasses!

Le Corbusier XXL

Last week I went to the optician to see if my eyes looked good. No pun intended. At all. Anyway. Except from discovering that I have worse eye-sight than I thought I also found out that I have asymmetrical irises. That made me feel very unique and mysterious. I don't know if it has any practical consequences though. But now I definitely need new glasses. Right now I'm trying out progressive contact lenses. If that's what it's called in English. Anyway, it's advanced.

This weekend I went to Stockholm to hang out with M & S, and to get inspired by the Stockholm Furniture Fair. After a way too long trip (flight delays in Oslo due to snow chaos in Stockholm) I arrived at my destination on Friday night. After a freezing walk trough Söder me and M met up with S at a small club with many types of wallpaper, where we had colourful drinks and danced the cold away.

On Saturday we went to the Furniture Fair. Very inspiring, I definitely found some cool stuff to have in mind in future projects. Not many pictures though, the exhibitors will unfortunately have to do their own advertising. We ended the day with home-made salmon lasagne - awesome! - and Melodifestivalen - disappointing! - and it was all in all a very good day.

Sunday began whit a long walk from Bromma to the city centre. I did some shopping, and we had lunch at Japanese restaurant Wagamama. To balance all of this this exercise and consumption we decided to visit Nordiska Museet. The exhibitions "Modets Makt" (the power of fashion) and Män i Baddräkt (men in swimsuits) can be recommended!

After this eventful and cosy weekend I only regret that I don't like flying, otherwise I'd go back sooner. Now I'm just going to wait a while, maybe until the trees are green.

Monday, 14 February 2011

Friday, 11 February 2011

One of my New Years resolutions was to start eating breakfast again. And now I have! As part of my new morning ritual (50 minutes in total from bed to door instead of 35 ) I now eat in front of the computer for 15 minutes while browsing through my favourite blogs, reading some news and checking the weather forecast. This is what I had yesterday morning:

vanilla yoghurt with home-made müsli, a small cup of coffee and a kiwi, nutritious and delicious!

Thursday, 10 February 2011

Earlier this week I got this pretty thing in my mail box. I bought it on Epla.no (norweigian Etsy) from C.H.J Creations and it was a perfect fit. I also bought a polka dotted skirt, but that one was slightly too big so I'll have to move a button a bit before I can use it. This white vintage dress however is ready for use and is currently packed in my suitcase. It and I will spend time in Stockholm this weekend, where I'm visiting M & S and the Furniture Fair. I'm sure I'll have many things to blog about when I return.

Wednesday, 9 February 2011

Yesterday I bought two post-cards with motives made by the awesome Martine Roch. Her human/animals are both cute and creepy, always an amazing combination. I put them in pretty golden frames I thrifted a while back, and now I'm walking from room to room to find the perfect place to put these adorable guys. Plus I haven't come up with names for them yet, and that's a must in my book.

Tuesday, 8 February 2011

Today I wore one of my favourite dresses.I don't have any full-figure pictures of me in it, but I managed to get pictures of the pretty details. I bought this one some years ago online from the store ellos.se, because I liked the vintage look. It makes me think of having vanilla milshakes in the sun.

collar with flowers

and the buttons have flowers on the as well!

With its sheer fabric and soft yellow tone I guess it would work better in the summer, but I think it's a bit too see-trough and prefer to use it with black tights and a top underneath. The labels says Johanna Klasson by ellos, and I think that Johanna has done a very good job. I especially like how the stripes changes direction. I imagine that it creates flattering illusions.

Monday, 7 February 2011

I had a very interesting dream tonight. I dreamt that I'd got an intern-ship with a guy who was digging up cable for some huge building project. He was an older guy with white hair and a big smile and he showed me around this big field covered with bright green grass, turned into mud at some places where he had driven his noisy machine. Anyway. He wanted me to dig a hole in the mud to find the cable that he wanted to pull up from the ground. So I did. I apparently have mad skills with a shovel, by the way. And here's where the dream turn into a thrifters wet-dream. I dug right into an old camping wagon from the 70s! And I found a box filled with two (probably fully functional) cameras - a Hasselblad and a Nikon. Plus some old clothes I did not have the time to search trough. And Drutten och Gena-dolls. Guess if I was bitter when I woke up...

Photo of a photo. Print by lovely Jessica Silversaga in my window. Like a dream. But this photo is better in real life

Sunday, 6 February 2011

For some time now it has been a tradition of sorts among some of our friends to enjoy a nice hamburger after work on Fridays. Me and A try to join as often as we can, because a burger is after all a burger. Plus, we try out new restaurants quite often, and one should always strive to expand ones horizons, right?

This time we tried the burgers at Bevaremigvel, in Stavanger centre.

As burgers go, this was a real good one
.

and the restaurant was cosy too.

After a nice meal with 14 nice people, some of us headed out for a drink. We ended up at Gnu. This place has a very interesting décor... wall-paper with alp-motif in the ceiling... almost as impressive as the baroque churches in Rome.

Well, hello there!

This is a diary, of sorts, written by me, Annika, architect turned graphic design student. I spent my first 26 years in Sweden, the following 7 in Norway and now I live with my husband and two cats in Brunei, on the tropical island Borneo. Read my blog if you - like me - are fond of traveling, dressing up, reading fantasy, watching loads of Netflix, looking at cats, dancing Lindy hop and eating candy. Occasionally I get creative and, well, create stuff. When that happens I'll most likely blog about it. Welcome!